


Things to Do When You're Alone

by Impractical Beekeeping (Impractical_Beekeeping)



Series: Songs of Expedience [4]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Anger, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Dead Languages, Deduction, Depression, Drug Addiction, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Obsessive Behaviour, Swearing, creative use of tart cards, therapy evasion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-11
Updated: 2012-06-19
Packaged: 2017-11-05 04:07:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/402268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Impractical_Beekeeping/pseuds/Impractical%20Beekeeping
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post Reichenbach, John Watson's viewpoint. This is a continuation of the story told in Things to Do When You Are Dead and Fearful Symmetry. Multiple characters will appear. Expect grief, violence, and slow deduction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. If You Were To Kill Me Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes I find this thought in my head that I've missed something. Something enormous and terrifying.

4:33 and I cannot get back to sleep. Another horrible fucking dream. Plenty of contenders for that these days.

This one wasn't about the war, or - 

Well, it wasn't about you.

It was about me being chased through the dark by someone I thought was a friend. Nice bloke from uni. We did anatomy labs together. I haven't seen him in years, actually, so goodness knows where that came from. Anyway, he had a knife, and I had nothing.

I woke up and thought I had been screaming, but naturally I wasn't. Just lying there with my arms folded across my chest. Everything was terribly still. I should have heard you downstairs, doing _something._

Something annoying, probably. That'd be fine. I could come downstairs and tell you to piss off, and then I'd make us tea. And I'd stay up until it was time for work because you'd have something interesting you wanted to tell me about. Or I'd come down and find you asleep on the sofa, and check you hadn't left the gas on or worse.

Once I came down and found you'd fallen asleep with a handful of biros in assorted colours. I watched them fall out of your hand (which was over your head - how does anyone fall asleep like that?) and slowly hit you, one by one, in the face. You didn't wake up. To be fair, that was after a particularly harrowing week. After the pool. I don't think I ever did tell you about that. I should have.

I've got absolutely nothing to do tomorrow. I was put on probation at the clinic, and I suppose I can't blame anyone for that except myself. I could, but I won't. I assaulted a police officer - the Chief Superintendent - and this time, there was only so much Greg could do about that, after everything else. 

I've been here, and that's punishment enough. I'm sorry, but it is. I look around the flat, and nearly everything is yours.

I don't think I can stay here anymore.

I tried to clean out the fridge the other day. It was unusually clean already. A couple of petri dishes. Some off milk. Some _very_ off cheese. No thumbs. No blood. I never did ask you why _that_ was in there, or where it came from. As if that matters. It doesn't, does it?

Blood is... Not a thing I should think about. It's what I see when I close my eyes, more often than not. I have seen - I have _touched_ \- enough blood for a lifetime. The blood of friends.

I keep seeing yours. On the ground, and on your face.

The cabs wouldn't take you the last time you looked like that. No one's taking you anywhere now.

Why am I talking to you, Sherlock? You're not here. You're never going to say anything again. What you did say was bad enough.

Why did you say those things? Why did you say them to _me?_ As if you could make me hate you.

All right. I do hate you. Right now, I really do.

Friends don't do that, what you did. I know you never cared much for that kind of consideration, but even you should have worked that one out.

Why on earth didn't you trust me enough to tell me what you were doing? Because yes: I would have stopped you. But maybe I could have helped you find another way to handle things. I refuse to believe your reputation mattered that much. In fact, I know it didn't.

You were a show-off, yes. The biggest. But I know what mattered most to you: being right. How the hell was this, in any way, right?

There are plenty of people I should be angry with. Moriarty, of course. That reporter, and everyone who believed their lies. Most of the people from the Yard. Myself for being so thick I couldn't work out what you were doing until it was too late. But I keep coming back to you, and it makes me sick.

Sometimes I find this thought in my head that I've missed something. Something enormous and terrifying.

How can you be dead? How is that even remotely a possibility? You went around all the time as if you were immortal, and god help me, I think I even began to believe it myself. I've seen you do so many dangerous, so many _stupid_ things, and every damned time you walked away.

You should have had wings, you mad bastard.

Sometimes people do survive that sort of fall. Not very well, but they do. I thought - for a second - no, I _hoped_ , that you had managed it. But then I saw your eyes, and they saw nothing.

I don't even remember how I got there, to you, but I do remember that. Your eyes, so horribly blank. Tried to take your pulse, but they wouldn't let me.

I know I had a knock on the head, and I know that the sedatives and the shock and the rest of it makes everything that happened afterwards seem strange and wrong.

Actually, it _was_ wrong.

That's a bit... odd.

St. Bart's doesn't have an A&E anymore. And ambulances don't come by the pathology building, do they? So what happened, exactly? How were they there before I was? All those people? I didn't lose much time on the ground. I _know_ I didn't.

What does that mean?

You'd know.

It's just a little thing, but now it's going to bother me. There's got to be a perfectly rational explanation. I should ask Molly. Or Mike.

No. I can't. I can't talk to them right now. They're all so kind, so careful. The thing about kindness is, _it_ _doesn't fucking work_ sometimes.

Is that the sort of argument you would have made? Oh god, it is, isn't it? I am not, _not_ allowed to become you. You've changed me, but not like that.

Honestly, though. I can't take all this solicitous behaviour from our friends. It makes it all worse. Makes _me_ feel worse for being angry.

The maddening thing about all of this is that I am so used to watching other people get through it. Grief. Know the stages of. God.

I know how this goes, and it's a bit frightening, really. Because someday I'm going to wake up, and there'll be a blank space where Sherlock Holmes should be. And how could that possibly ever be true?

I suppose in your case, I should call it dark matter. Suits you better.

Dark matter. I wonder whether you knew what that was. You were so selective, if brilliant. I can't think about the solar system without calling you a git, after all. You must have been hell on toast in primary school. I'd ask your brother, but I think we've hit the point where I will never be kidnapped by him again. That suits me fine.

How the hell did he manage to let this happen? The man's got cameras all over London. Probably all over the country. Probably in our flat. I've got half a mind to go back to his ridiculous club and make him tell me. I suppose they lock you up and throw away the key if you stab the British Government with his own umbrella. 

He'd better be running Moriarty down. Come to think of it, the man must be sitting on enough evidence to... to... do _something,_ anyway.

Why didn't he stop this? Any of it? Clearly he cared enough about his brother to attempt to bribe me into being his minder. He made me search the flat for drugs. He made me tell him lies about Irene Adler. So where the hell was he all this time? Oh, right. Selling Sherlock out for information. Did he get what he wanted, then? Just...Just find Moriarty and have him killed, would you, Mycroft?

Ha. Or I could do it myself.

Don't be stupid, John. Clearly, what justice requires is a doctor run mad. No. Life isn't a film. You wouldn't be able to find him, let alone work out a way to kill him.

God, I wish I could. 

What the hell is wrong with me?

Oh, right. 

I suppose the responsible thing would be to see my - **No**. I'm not doing that. Not right now. It wouldn’t help.

Yeah, so.

I should call Harry. That's a distraction. Perhaps I can stay with her for a bit. Do something useful. Try not to kill her.

That's a good deed. 

So... I'll give it a few hours. I can do that.

I will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title comes from Suzanne Vega's song, "In the Eye."


	2. There's Always Something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is perfectly ordinary to look at people and wonder about their lives. It is completely fine and sane. People do it all the time.

**Things not to think about (on the train):**

  * The flat
  * Your things in the flat
  * The violin
  * Your things _not_ in the flat
  * The skull
  * The chemistry equipment going to a school
  * Your books going... _not_ to a school
  * Things left behind in the flat
  * Things I left behind in the flat
  * Things I took away from the flat
  * _You'll_ never know, so why do I feel guilty?
  * Because I invaded your privacy.
  * Dead men don't care about that sort of thing.



_Obviously._

  * You would, though.



_Irrelevant._

  * I stole something from you.



_Interesting._

  * Stop.



I'm on a train to Swindon. Harry moved there with Clara six years ago. Last time I was there, I was just passing through on my way to London. My sister had just split up with Clara (again), was completely pissed the entire time I was there, and gave me her phone. The engraved one with the scratches on it.

__

Stop.

Swindon. Well, it's not London, is it? So that's good. This is exactly what I should be doing. 

Harry says she's stopped drinking. I wonder what that will be like. It's a bit sad to think that our relationship has largely revolved around me being angry with her and her being angry with me because I’m angry. Also me being gone, of course, and all those maudlin (yeah, okay: _drunken_ ) messages she used to send me. In Afghanistan. On the blog. On my phone.

**John, why don't you write to me? Just once?**

_I do. Not often, I know. But I_ do.

__

**John, I've fucked it up again. Everything. Be glad you don't have a girlfriend. Or do you? No. Can't imagine you do.**

_You're right about that. No time, anyway._

**John, I've knit you a jumper. I saw something about it being cold at night in Afghanistan. Sorry it's a bit late for Christmas.**

_It was massive, and a bit weird, but yeah. That was nice. Didn’t know you knew how._

__

**OMG, John!!! I knew something bad would happen! Are you coming home?!?**

_Possibly. When they’ve finished with me. When the paperwork is done. When I’m not completely rotten with painkillers. Define “home.”_

__

**John, Clara’d legt me. For good.**

_And I can see you’re drunk because of the typos._

__

**John, I worry about you and that new flatmate you have.**

_Don’t._

__

***comment deleted***

_What now, Harry?_

__

**I’ve stopped drinking.**

_Good._

_***_

I glance around the compartment at the other travellers. I’m tired of seeing my own face reflected in the window, and the landscape is predictable.

To my left, there’s a pretty blonde woman (mid-thirties) with two equally blonde children, a boy and a girl. She’s wearing a blue dress with a floral pattern. Not terribly expensive-looking. No ring on her hand, no tan line where one should be. She is reading from a tablet or an e-reader (I’m not clear on the difference, exactly. Something electronic). The kids are well-behaved and neatly dressed. The girl might be seven and the boy four or five. They’re sharing a big picture book of (appropriately enough) British Rail trains. Not cartoon ones, real ones. They have their heads together and are whispering. He’s asking questions, she’s answering. A proud big sister, then.

I wonder where their father is. Have they got one? She’s clearly their mother; the family resemblance is quite strong. 

They look happy. Harry and I might have looked like that once. Ages the other way round, of course, and a bit further apart. _Our_ father wouldn’t have been with us, either. Mum would have been wearing her ring, though. She almost never took it off. Just to do the washing-up. 

Kids. I wonder if I’ll have them someday. Well, and a wife, of course. That’s the first step...  I suppose I might be running out of time for that one.  Having kids, I mean. I wouldn’t want to be the embarrassing ancient dad turning up at school plays and making awkward conversation with my daughter’s dates. Would I have daughters? Would they be like Harry? Would I be like my father? 

Okay. You probably _shouldn’t_ have kids, John. Although if I did, and they were gay, I’d be fine with that. Better than my parents were about Harry, surely. Well. That was twenty years ago. I suppose most people were a bit funny with that. I suppose I was a bit funny about it myself when Harry brought a girl home from school with her. Or was that because Dad was awful about it and I was just... Just awkward. I didn’t say anything bad -- I just didn’t say enough, really. Should have tried.

Aha! The woman _is_ married. Or something. He must have been in the loo. I clearly wasn’t paying any attention when we boarded the car. I was a bit preoccupied, I guess. Anyway, seems like a decent bloke, if a bit boring looking. Kissing her cheek. She’s smiling.  Wonder what he does for a living. Absolutely no idea. Shoes... Well, work boots of some kind. Has a bit of a tan. Works outdoors? He’s got a shirt on with a Tube symbol on it. Tourists? Must be. Had a family weekend in London. Just a weekend, because they don’t seem to have lots of luggage with them. Well, but they might. The bigger bags are stowed by the door. But I don’t think so. 

Why don’t I think so?

It is _perfectly ordinary_ to look at people and wonder about their lives. It is completely fine and sane. People do it all the time. 

Why did I look at her hands, then? 

She’s attractive. Reflex? 

_Do I do that?_

Okay. I look at people because I think someone will quiz me later, and I’ll get most of it wrong. 

No.

Noticing people ( _observing them_ ) is completely fine. I’ve always noticed people. I’m a doctor. Yes, I am a doctor. I am, I have been, and I will be again. 

Good. Talk to Sarah in a week or so. She’s understanding. Mostly understanding. When she doesn’t think I’m mad. I’m not. I’m just-

I wish I had a book. Or a newspaper. No. Not a newspaper. 

Text Harry? 

 _Harry, I’m.._. I’m on the train. Idiot. She knows that. 

 _Harry, can I bring anything..._ What, from the **train?** No.

__

_Harry, want to see a film tonight?_ No. That’s a bit too “Good to see you! Let’s not talk for a few hours!” 

No.

***

As it happens, we do not go to see a film, and we do talk, but that’s all right. She looks good. Rested, even. Younger than I am, for the first time in years. Hands, not shaking. Eyes clear. She’s driving again, so things must have stayed manageable. 

Her house is a bit bare, but it looks clean. She still has watercolours in Clara’s delicate hand hung on the walls, but they seem to fit. The rest of her decor is modern, carefully tasteful. 

She’s working for a technology firm, which is apparently what Swindon has quite a lot of now. Still in Marketing, and I still can’t quite imagine her doing _that_. But she always has been charming, even if that charm sometimes had to come out of a bottle. I suppose Dad was the same way

She shows me a room with pink sheets and a case full of books, mostly murder mysteries. Can’t get away from that, it seems, but at least I know that I am unlikely to encounter anything there that _you_ would approve of. Certainly not the titles.

I help her make dinner, which is beautifully ordinary and involves a pleasing range of summer vegetables that I have to help slice. Not much kitchen gear, but I suppose Clara took most of it when she left.

Clara, who I do not mention, just as she does not mention you. And I can feel the shapes of two people we’re very carefully _not mentioning_ pressing behind the words we are saying, but I feel calm, better than I have felt in ages. 

We talk about her trip to Germany (business) and I talk about some trips I’ve taken myself (Dublin, for a conference), New Zealand (to see a friend). Because I mention New Zealand, she asks if it looks like Middle Earth, and I say, “Absolutely, but much safer without all the orcs and mad wizards.” 

Harry says she wishes she lived in a Hobbit hole and I say that would be lovely. She says she thinks the built-in shelves they have in their holes are brilliant, and I agree (but for a moment I see hideous wallpaper instead of wood, so I look out the window for a bit). 

“We should have a film festival,” she says. “I’ve got all the DVDs.”  

“I’d like that,” I say. “Perhaps you’ve also got some friends who can join us.”

She’s quiet for a moment and smiles, and says, “I do, actually.” 

“Are any of them straight and single?” I ask.

“Mostly the men,” she says, and I throw a tasteful sofa cushion at her, but I’ve forgotten she’s got this positively brutal throwing arm on her. I have to admit defeat right quick because I’m tired and my shoulder’s a bit stiff.

We drink some expensive ginger beer and she tells me about a redhead that works in her office who is not quite, but _nearly_ as pretty as Karen Gillan, but neither so tall nor so Scottish. Then we talk about Doctor Who, and whether the next Doctor will be ginger, or a woman, or a ginger woman (Harry says she should be a woman, but not ginger -- I say both), and I realise I haven’t had a conversation like this in ages. Certainly not with Harry, but really, not with _anyone_. And that’s a bit sad.

Eventually she says, “Well, I’ve got to work in the morning. You can watch telly if you want to stay up.”

She gives me the remote control and turns out most of the lights. I mean to turn it on, but I sit there in the dark, just breathing and listening to a barking dog. Before I know it, I’ve fallen asleep. 

I dream about New Zealand and Hobbits in gardens, and I’m dimly aware that it’s turning into that party they had in the first film. I’m standing on a hillside with a woman who is my wife. My _Hobbit_ wife, which must mean that I’m also a Hobbit, although quite a tall one, thank you very much. She’s got gorgeous red hair and a lovely smile, and she’s holding my hand as we watch the others setting up what must be, yes, the fireworks. I think, _That’s not terribly safe. Everything’s so flammable,_ but it doesn’t bother me the way it should. 

They set off the one that turns into a dragon, and it flies low over the tents, all sparks and burning. She turns to me and laughs and says, _It’s all a magic trick,_ as it burns out and falls over the garden, dark and diminished.

I desperately need to remember something, something _important,_ and I can’t. 

 _What’s the magic trick?_  

_What am I not seeing?_

__

_Did I get something wrong?_

__

There’s always something. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is Arthur Conan Doyle’s 153rd birthday today. I don’t believe that dead men care about birthday observances, but that said: Thank you for being one of the authors who made my childhood tolerable, sir. Thank you for originating material that compels me to write again, too.
> 
> According to the “official” blog, Harry was 36 at the time John moved into Baker Street. Also, John visited a friend in New Zealand and Sherlock apparently never even noticed he was away.
> 
> General disclaimer: This is completely unlike anything I’ve written before. I’m making meta references to popular culture, and that feels a bit like shoes on a cat. In some ways I like this. In other ways I loathe it. I can't write John Watson the way I wrote the other two stories in this series.


	3. The Second Pillar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I’m not going to make you cups of tea you’ll never drink. I’m not going to send you texts you’ll never answer. I will, and this is important, never address you aloud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations are in the end note.

It seems I’ve been judged sane enough to return to work. 

That’s something. And it’s interesting, isn’t it? All I had to do was decide on a course of action and all the pieces fell into place. Because I am sane _enough._

__

Sane enough to convince my sister I’ll be fine. Sane enough to convince my therapist I trust her. The irony is, I think that this sanity of mine actually takes a certain sort of madness to achieve convincingly. Or maybe that’s all anyone ever does. Might be, at that.

For some reason, we’ve decided as a culture that mourning has to happen a certain way. We’re supposed to choose to let someone go, to move on. 

Well, I’ve chosen not to choose, in a way.

If I were gone and you were not, would you sometimes forget this and speak to me as if I were still there? I think you might. You always did before.

I am not you, and I cannot forget that you are gone. 

I’m not going to make you cups of tea you’ll never drink. I’m not going to send you texts you’ll never answer. I will, and this is important, never address you aloud. 

I did that once, and you were still dead, because _life is not a fucking fairy tale._

I am moving back to the flat. Our flat. I talked to Mrs. Hudson, and it’s fine. 

I am going to work when the clinic needs me. I talked to Sarah, and that’s fine.

I am going to see Mike and Bill and possibly even Greg Lestrade. We will watch films and drink beer. 

I will do all of these things, and I am still going to keep thinking about what you said to me, and _why_ you might have said it. Because now I think there was something else you wanted me to hear. Something that might be useful.

You always wanted me to try to work things out myself. It’s not easy, but I’m trying.

****

There are some things I’ve never told you. Things about me, of course, but also things about you. 

You made a  _terrible_ sociopath. 

You never told me lies if you could help it. You were perfectly willing to allow me to believe some pretty dreadful things about you, but you were careful not to lie. While that says some interesting things about your psyche, it does not actually say _sociopath._ Which is, incidentally, no longer the approved term for what you pretended to be. "Antisocial Personality Disorder" doesn’t sound quite as bad, does it? Not bad enough.

You wanted to be a crime scene _._ Your words were the tape. 

You _were_ fond of people. Not everyone, to be sure, but you were. Mrs. Hudson, to name but one.

Recently, I’ve had to come to terms with the notion that I said some very, very bad things to you, about you not caring when I thought Mrs. Hudson was dying; about you being a machine instead of a person. 

I think you were responsible for that telephone call; that’s why you pretended, yes, _pretended_ not to care. I think I needed to leave, not so you could think, but so you could do something without me there to get in the way. 

_What was it?_

I ask myself this, and I feel so strange. Angry and hopeful at the same time.

This was one of the things that made me realise that the trick to getting through therapy is only talking about half of what you believe.

My therapist thinks you wanted to distance me so I wouldn’t be hurt by what you did. Not successfully, I’d argue. Frankly, that seems simplistic.

She also thinks our friendship was monumentally fucked up. My words, not hers. I do all the swearing, as per usual.

I wonder what she’d say if I told her everything? 

****

Here’s something I never told you:

I found something strange once. In my wardrobe, under a floorboard. I left it where it was. More importantly, I never told your brother, or Greg, or _you_ what I had found. 

It’s a red leather case, narrow and reasonably small. I think it’s the kind of leather they used to call _morocco._  It has gold decorations stamped into it, but otherwise, it’s quite shabby. 

You, of course, would know exactly what’s inside. 

By the time I found it, it was already clear to me that your past was a bit more colourful than I might have suspected. So the hypodermic? Not a big surprise. The old straight razor? Practical and elegant, I suppose. A touch dramatic. The capped test tube with white lumps in it? I’d call that positively anticlimactic.

The scrap of paper wrapped around the glass was the thing that made me carefully put everything back in its place and pretend I’d never seen it.

The handwriting was yours, of course. I’ve seen it often enough, sometimes elegant, sometimes spiky and urgent, sometimes just a childish scrawl. Always unmistakably yours.

This was very carefully inscribed: _γνῶθι σεαυτόν_

It has been decades since I did a bit of Greek in school. I wasn’t terribly good at it, although the alphabet stuck in my head for some reason. It took me quite a while to remember what the words meant. Later, it took me far too long to look them up on the computer at work to check I was right.  

What I remembered was, there were supposed to be two inscriptions at Delphi. Two pillars, I think, although I might be wrong. The two things together, as Mr. Davies impressed upon us, meant far more than either one could alone. They were, essentially, a lesson in _how to be good._

It’s the things people _don’t_ say that often seem to be the most important. It’s the things you don’t quite see at first that turn out to be the most important, too. You’ve often said as much.

I think the thing you didn’t write was this: _μηδεν ἀγαν_

Whether you couldn’t write it, or simply chose not to, I’ll probably never know.

What I do know is this: When things got bad, I used to go back and check the box sometimes. When Irene Adler died the first time, I checked. When Moriarty nearly killed us, I checked. When you tried to quit smoking for the millionth time and practically begged me to let you change your mind, I checked. Yet nothing, absolutely _nothing_ inside that box ever changed. Even right before you did something horrible that I still don’t understand.

And while absolutely everything I stand for as a doctor, as your _friend_ , said I ought to do something, ought to take the damned box and destroy it, I never did.

I think it was a test and a challenge. For yourself, but also for me. 

You could have left it anywhere, but you left it in my room. 

While the contents never changed, the amount of dust on the surface did.

This is what I stole before I left to stay with Harry.

I’m telling you this because it is something I find extraordinary and glorious and strange.

I’m telling you this because I’m mad enough to think that sometimes you let me be the second pillar.

And it may be too late, but I’m listening to you again. 

  


  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you didn’t have a classical education, you’ll want to know what the Greek means.
> 
> γνῶθι σεαυτόν means “know thyself.”  
> μηδεν ἀγαν means “nothing in excess.”
> 
> I have tattoos. This might be what they say.


	4. Dead Man's Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “If I explain it, it doesn’t work,” you tell me. “You were supposed to observe.”

My dreams are getting stranger and stranger. I wonder whether this is the result of some incredibly dull days spent delivering ‘flu jabs and filling out NHS paperwork. Perhaps my subconscious mind is rebelling against the tedium. If I were you, I’d be shooting the wall...If I still had my gun. 

I’ve begun writing the dreams down because I keep having this horrid looming feeling that I’m forgetting important details. Something true and real seems to be tapping at the window of my mind, but I can’t make out its shape.

Some of them are very realistic in tone, but others are complete works of fantasy. I try to drink less tea before bed, drink beer before bed, and drink nothing before bed, but none of it really helps. It’s making me tired and restless at the same time.

One night I dream about Irene Adler.

I walk into the living room with a mug of tea and a jar of something suspicious I’ve found in the refrigerator. I want to ask you why the contents have what I suspect is an arsenical sheen (grey and faintly metallic), and I’m reasonably certain I won’t like the answer or its potential implications for our hand blender. Instead of you, I see The Woman.

She’s sprawled on the sofa with her feet on the armrest, wrapped in your old blue dressing gown. The sight is inexplicably maddening, much as it was in life. How _dare_ she come in here and treat your things as her own?  And besides, she’s -

“You’re dead,” I protest.

She smiles at me with her red, red lips. “So is Sherlock Holmes,” she reminds me. “Look at us both.”

“Look at what?” I ask, and she pulls a small rubber ball out of her pocket and begins tossing it from hand to hand. 

“Never mistake what I say for meaning,” she admonishes, and suddenly throws the ball against the wall. It bounces and lands, ever-so-gently, _impossibly,_ in my tea. Somehow the liquid remains placid and undisturbed.

“You’re not making sense,” I say.

“Whatever remains, no matter how mad it might seem, must be the truth,” she says, and I know she’s quoting your website, _The Science of Deduction._ I can’t remember the two preceding statements, and I know I should.

I set my cup down on the table and fish the ball out of it. It is completely dry. “You’re not helping,” I tell her. “Why aren’t you helping?”

“I'm dead, John,” she reminds me. “It’s _ever_ so boring.” 

“Then stop,” I say. 

“Ah, but I can’t. You see, I’ve made a number of delicate arrangements. It would be a shame to ruin everything now.” 

I bounce the ball against the wall and watch a white line trace itself in the air to mark its path, a bit like a jet trail. I’m not sure why it would do this, so I catch it and throw it again and again. The lines remain.

“Why is it doing this?” I ask her. “What’s the trick?” I glance over at the sofa, and she’s not there. 

Instead, it’s you standing beside me, and you intercept the ball mid-bounce with your long fingers and tuck it into your coat pocket. “If I explain it, it doesn’t _work_ ,” you tell me. “You were supposed to _observe.”_

“I know I can get this, “ I say. “Just... Run it by me again?”

“Not enough time,” you tell me, and take me by the shoulders, quite roughly. “You’re not seeing it, John! _What aren’t you seeing?”_

I open my mouth because I suddenly know _exactly what you mean,_ but then I wake up. 

As it happens, I really _don’t_ know. But I write it all down anyway.

***

It’s the weekend at last, and I don’t have to go into the clinic, so I spend Saturday helping Mrs. Hudson hang new wallpaper in 221C. It’s hot and it’s messy and it hurts my shoulder, but it’s good to feel useful to someone. 

On Sunday afternoon, I take her thank-you scones over to my neighbour Bill so we can do tea and television. I like Bill. He doesn’t say much, but he’s intelligent in a calm and thoughtful sort of a way.  Sometimes we just sit without talking and it’s almost shocking to me how good it is to feel another human presence in the room.

He reminds me of the cat we had when I was a boy. Muffler was one of two brothers (Mittens was the other), and the smaller and quieter of the two. After Mittens was hit by a car, Muffler would sit bunched on the end of my desk and watch me doing my revisions. He didn’t want to be picked up, although Harry was always snatching him up when he least expected it. He just wanted to sit with someone who made no demands on him. 

Bill and I have a surprising amount in common: both ex-military, both a bit at loose ends. Both alone. “Almost everything I had apart from my books was bought by someone else,” he told me once, when I remarked upon his sparsely furnished flat. “It’s better this way. It’s comfortable.”

I think he has lost someone important and complicated, and that’s one of the things we don’t talk about. I never mention you at all, and it’s so strange to know someone who can see me without also thinking of you. It’s as if I’ve become someone completely different, simply by remaining the person I’ve always been.

We’re watching a special report on the demise of a weapons smuggling ring (in Tibet of all places), and I’m playing my usual internal game of _Were They Something to Do With Moriarty? Is Anyone Actually Doing_ ** _Anything?_** We hear sirens in the distance, but I dismiss them because it's London; it's ambience.

Quite a lot of sirens, though. Far too many, far too close.

But suddenly it's on the news we're watching: the Wellington Arch has exploded. On a Sunday afternoon.

Time seems to slow down, and I’m aware I’m dropping my cup, but I can’t seem to stop it. There's a roaring in my ears, and I feel the kind of glacial calm that I’m aware is actually a response to danger. It’s noradrenaline, and nothing new to me. 

Over the roaring, there are two things in my head, and the first is _Moriarty._ The second is, _I'm a doctor._

I'm fairly certain I say the second one (or something like it) to Bill, and I'm off running.

I run towards Hyde Park, which is not exactly close, but also not exactly accessible by any other means at this point. Traffic is at a standstill all down Baker Street, the side streets, and even on the A40.

I finally get to the south end of the park, and everything has been cordoned off. None of the police officers or emergency workers look familiar, and no one seems to know what is going on. I try to talk my way in, of course, but it's no good.

Things might have been different once, before I became a bystander. I could help, but I’m not allowed. It chokes me, this not being able to do anything.

The air is thick with grey dust and smoke here. Everywhere else, I’m aware, it’s a perfectly pleasant summer day. 

_Moriarty_ , I repeat to myself, and I turn away towards the Knightsbridge Tube station. As the air gets clearer, so does my head.

If this is Moriarty's doing, I reckon I owe him one already. Now seems as good a time as any, but I don't have my gun and I certainly don't have your brain. I don't even know where he is.

_There's always the British Government,_ I think and it is almost, but not quite, worth laughing at.

I no longer have Mycroft's number. He learned not to contact me after I refused to attend your funeral, he asked me where I was, and I said some relatively unforgivable things in response. Afterwards, I deleted his information. So that's no good.

You once summoned the police by firing rounds into the sky outside Irene Adler's house. Summoning Mycroft should be nearly as easy. Even today.

Perhaps especially today.

I have a black felt-tipped pen in my pocket, but no paper. Directly ahead of me is one of those ancient red telephone boxes. If I am extremely lucky, it will be papered with tart cards. 

The door is surprisingly difficult to pry open, but adrenaline does the job. As luck would have it, it is absolutely stuffed with cards. For no good reason, I am suddenly seized by indecision.

_Honestly, John. Just_ choose _one._

I select a yellow card with a bosomy brunette offering what appears to be a course of recreational scolding (because it's _yellow_ , that's why - it will provide a better contrast). I rip it off the wall and savagely scrawl "MYCROFT HOLMES" on the back in block letters. It only takes me a second to locate a CCTV camera and hold the note in front of it.

But life, as I keep reminding myself, is not a bloody fairy tale.

I wait for an hour. Nothing happens.

"This is completely futile," I say, and make my way home.

_I believe in Sherlock Holmes,_ say brick walls and plexiglass bus shelters as I pass them. I've been noticing this a lot lately. 

****

I eat and shower away the dust and I really don't think I'll be able to sleep, but I must have managed to, a bit. I dream the smell of dust and charred bodies and Moriarty saying _I will burn the heart out of you._

The black car arrives at half past six. Anthea waves me into the rear seat without a word, and I am surprised to see Mycroft and an attaché case already in residence. No secret warehouses today, then.

He looks thinner than I've ever seen him. He also looks as tired as I feel. "John," he says. "I've got ten minutes."

Pleasantries don't seem appropriate under the circumstances. "What happened today…It feels like something Jim Moriarty would do. Am I wrong?"

Mycroft looks at me, and I'm half expecting one of his strange little smiles that is not really a smile. Apparently he doesn't have it in him today. "Jim Moriarty is dead," he says. "He has been dead for several months." 

I am aware that it's ridiculous to start a fight in a parked car, but something boils to the surface in me, and I can't stop myself. "Do you think maybe, just _maybe_ , you might have told me that a _bit earlier?_ Any time before now would have been absolutely _brilliant._ "

Anthea looks up from her Blackberry for a second, but Mycroft shakes his head at her.  "John, he shot himself the day my brother..." He does us both the favour of dispensing with a verb.

I'm not feeling generous, so I say it for him. "The day he **died**." It comes out of my mouth so easily this time. My therapist would be proud, if I ever told her.

"I can't go into the details," Mycroft says, "But yes. He did."

"Before, or afterwards?"

"Before."

It's unsettling, the way I feel the ghost of your hands on my face, as if you're going to spin me in circles like you did that day I took a photograph of the graffiti and you went a bit mental on me.  _Think, John. Because if Moriarty died_ before _me, what I did makes_ no sense _. You've missed something important._

The car seems very small indeed. I am aware that smashing my fist into Mycroft Holmes' face will not be expedient. The car door, on the other hand, makes a fantastic substitute.

God, that hurts.

Before he can respond, I say, "There is something else you're not telling me. Did Sherlock know he was dead?"

I know that blank-and-deadly expression. I've seen it a million times on another man's face. I'm practically immune to it by now.

"If Moriarty was already dead, what was the _point?_   Why the hell would he have jumped _anyway?"_

"There was someone else there," Mycroft says. "A colleague."

"For insurance," I suggest very calmly, aware that someone is screaming in another part of my brain. "Is he… Is this person still out there? Was the Arch his doing?"

"We believe it was, yes. Unfortunately, we were unable to apprehend this man before something regrettable occurred."

"Well. That significantly reduces my remaining faith in the British government. _Sir."_

"We have identified him, however." Mycroft opens the attaché case and pulls out an envelope. "It seems he spent quite some time following you around London. Before the incident."

Following _me_.

"There were at least three gunmen. One assigned to you. One assigned to Detective Inspector Lestrade. One, we think, assigned to Mrs. Hudson."

_Stay exactly where you are. Don't move. Keep your eyes fixed on me._

"So you're saying... What are you saying?"

"All accounted for but one. He is ex-military, and we believe him to have been Moriarty's favoured lieutenant." Mycroft looks down at his hand, at the envelope. "His name is Sebastian Moran," he says, as if that should matter.

"Never heard of him."

"John, I think it is only fair to tell you that he may target you again. We have whittled away at the organisation, and this man is the final piece. We're quite certain he's aware we want him."

"Well, it's awfully sporting of you to warn me," I say. "Are we finished here?"

"Not entirely." He opens the envelope and removes a photograph. "Please take this," he says, pressing it into my hand. "We'll be watching, but if you see him, don't hesitate to contact me immediately. Perhaps less theatrically this time."

"You'll have to give me your number," I say. "I'm afraid I've deleted it."

He does, and I wrench the car door open and step out onto the street. Anthea stops me and hands me a suspiciously heavy parcel. The weight is familiar and comforting.

The car pulls away from the kerb, and I glance at the photograph in my hand. 

The best lies are the ones you don't have to tell. Because I realise I _do_ know Sebastian Moran, after all.

"Mycroft Holmes," I whisper once I'm back in the flat, the SIG beside me on the sofa like an old friend, "You have no idea what you have just done. I really don't think you do."

Thanks to him, I know two important things, and they go singing through my head with certainty and elation and despair.

I know Sebastian Moran because he could have been my friend. He very nearly was, was Bill Richardson.

The other thing is better, and it is also worse. I am going to try very hard indeed not to do something stupid, because it would be such a terrible waste of what has already been done.

What _you_ did, Sherlock.

I might have missed some important details, and I probably have. I also know the sort of twisted games Jim Moriarty liked to play.

I think he wanted the final word, and he would have loved nothing better than making you say it for him.

If he was dead, and if you _knew_ he was dead, I think I do know why you did what you did that day.

I'm thinking, perhaps, you did it for me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you’ve never heard of tart cards, they're advertisements for ladies (well, usually ladies) of easy virtue. In this age of mobile phones, I suppose it's as good a use as any for the iconic red telephone boxes of London.
> 
> The Dead Man's Hand is a specific hand of cards "Wild Bill" Hickok is said to have been playing when he was shot and killed. Most, but not all, sources agree that it consisted of two aces, two eights, and a mysterious fifth card.


	5. Friends are What Keep You Safe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I should not be doing what I am doing. I know the whereabouts of a man who has, in all likelihood, caused the deaths of at least twenty-five people, and I am deliberately keeping that information to myself. I should not take the return of my gun as license to settle the matter myself. I should not, but I do.

I should not be doing what I am doing. I know the whereabouts of a man who has, in all likelihood, caused the deaths of at least twenty-five people, and I am deliberately keeping that information to myself. I should not take the return of my gun as license to settle the matter myself. I should not, but I do. 

I don't see him until two weeks have passed. Plenty of time to consider my actions and the danger of seeing him, of making myself an available target. It's entirely possible, no _probable,_ that I am being watched by Mycroft's people. I should be. 

I'm coming home from work one day, and there he is, Sebastian Moran, padding towards his flat from the opposite end of Baker Street. 

"John," he says, his voice soft as always, the ghost of a crooked smile on his face. "Haven't seen you for a while." 

I don't know what I _should_ do, but it is almost certainly not this. I nod. I smile. I am completely calm.

"I was just going to put some tea on," he says. "Care to join me?" 

"I think I will," I say, my voice as steady as surgery. It's a dangerous game with the SIG tucked in my bag beneath the remains of my lunch and a Daily Mail. I can feel his true name burning in my mind. 

This should not be easy, but it is.

We enter his flat, and I sit down at his kitchen table. He makes us tea, and I am acutely aware of my bag on the floor beside me, of the gun. I am so very calm. He may try to kill me. It could be today.

It seems that it is not. 

"I've been a bit worried about you," he says, his back to me, his movements unhurried.

This is not, by any stretch, something I'd expect him to say.  "Worried? What do you mean?"

He hands me my tea and sits down in the chair against the wall. "Sorry. It's not a thing we talk about. " He wraps his fingers around his cup, then pulls them back from the heat. "Afghanistan."

"No," I agree. 

"It can't be easy for you, seeing a thing like that. Knowing the extent of the damage."

"What isn't easy," I say sharply, "is not being able to help." 

"I'm sorry," he says. "Of course."

“Since I’ve been back in London, I... I had a friend I used to go to crime scenes with. To help the police.”

“I know,” he says, unblinking. “What you’ve done is admirable.”

I find this increasingly surreal. "Well, a great many things have changed.”

He studies me with his strange cat's eyes. “And they won’t let you help now.” 

“No.” 

“That makes it all the more difficult.”

“Is it difficult for _you?”_ I ask. _Do you know that I know?_

"Yes.” He studies his tea. “It is a terrible thing to see beauty destroyed." 

"The _Arch?_   What about the people?"

"I was _talking_ about the people," he says. He meets my eyes again, and I can't tell whether he's lying. “I’ve done things like this myself, you know. You put people back together. It has been my... duty to take them apart.”

And what, really, am I to say to this?

This isn't the first time I've had tea with a murderer, but it is certainly the strangest. I wonder if he would tell me the truth if I asked him. _He's had every opportunity to kill me,_ I think, _and he hasn't. Why?_

For that matter, it would be the easiest thing in the world for me to have shot him while he made the tea, but I didn't. For all that I know him to be an associate of Moriarty's, for all that I've been told he has been stalking me for months, for all that he may very well have blown up the Arch himself, I still have to be certain. 

The silence is no longer comfortable. It can't be, anymore. 

It's a relief when my phone pulses against my leg. "Sorry," I say, and shift to pull it out of my pocket. Sebastian Moran nods, and sips his tea.

It's Greg Lestrade.

_You around? I stopped by to see you and Mrs. Hudson thought you should be home by now. I can only eat so many biscuits._

_I'm just down the street. Hold on. I'll be there soon_ , I reply.

"Sorry to do this," I say, "but someone is waiting for me. I'd better go."

"Not to worry," he says. "I've got a game in a bit."

 _What kind of game?_ I think, and retrieve my bag, careful not to betray its contents. 

"See you," he says. And in that flat, whispered voice of his that makes inflection so difficult to judge, “Take care of yourself.”

***

Greg and Mrs. Hudson are in the living room when I arrive. "Good to see you," I say. "I was just visiting a friend.” _And when I say_ friend... 

"That nice Bill Richardson," Mrs. Hudson says.

“How's the Yard?" I sit in your chair. It still feels wrong.

"John," Greg says. "I came by because I wanted to tell you something."

Another warning about Sebastian Moran?

"About Sherlock.  And the investigation."

"Oh dear," Mrs. Hudson says, and pours me a cup of tea, unasked. 

I accept the cup. “What is it?” 

“Things are coming out now. That’s why I’ve been reinstated. I mean, it’s pretty clear that the Richard Brook thing was a complete load of bollocks.”

“Of course it was.”

Mrs. Hudson, hovering despite her hip, pats me on the shoulder. She smells of lemon.

“Thing is, John, we’ve got something new.” 

My phone chooses this moment to go off again. I ignore it. I lean forward in my seat. “What?”

Greg looks apologetic. “We’ve... Someone sent us Sherlock’s phone.”

“What, _now?”_

“It seems it wasn’t with him when he...He must have left it behind, on the roof.”

“Okay.” 

Greg is not a man I’m used to seeing stumble over words. This cannot be easy for him. Still, I want to shake him by the shoulders. _Get on with it._

__

“There’s a recording. It’s Sherlock and Moriarty.”

I am distantly aware of Mrs. Hudson sitting down at this.

“Their conversation makes it quite clear that Moriarty was everything we had believed him to be, that Sherlock believed him to be. We can use it to clear his name, John.” 

When I say nothing, Greg looks at me, anxious. “It’s also apparent that Moriarty is dead.”

“I know _that._ Mycroft told me. Hell, he probably sent you the phone. Although he didn’t tell me that he had it when we talked.”

“Ah.” Greg swallows, awkwardly. “So, you know that... You know why Sherlock felt he had to do it.”

“Because of us,” I say. “He wanted to protect us.”

It’s what the funeral should have been, but wasn’t. It is complicated by having to explain things to Mrs. Hudson. I let Greg talk. 

I wonder if they’d let me hear the recording. I wonder if I could stand to. 

My mind is racing, but at the same time, everything is terribly still. Like a dream, right before the bad things begin.  _Like a dream,_ I think, watching Mrs. Hudson dropping sugar lumps in her tea. They seem to fall so slowly.

Or a _magic trick._

“Oh god.” And I must say it aloud, because they both turn to look at me.

I wave them away. What I’m thinking is completely mad. 

_So it’s probably true._

__

Eventually they leave me alone. It’s getting late. 

My head is awash in rubber balls and invisible lines and a distant memory of a teacher that liked to draw stick figures falling out of lifts and off of buildings. Physics and trigonometry were not my best subjects. I was too preoccupied with girls.

There is _still_ something I’m not seeing, but I am suddenly, insanely certain of one thing: There’s a strong possibility that you are _not dead._

I don’t sleep. I can’t.

Periodically my phone grinds against the carpet where I've thrown it. It's Mycroft calling. I don't answer.

***

I am not pleased when I come down the next morning and find two men in suits in my living room. One of them is Mycroft Holmes. 

"Ah, John."  He manages to invest my name with a great deal of exasperation. "It appears you've been rather dishonest with me."

"Likewise," I say. "I suppose _you're_ talking about Sebastian Moran."

"Well, indeed," he says. "You neglected to mention your friendship.”

"If by that you mean I know him and he hasn't killed me yet, then yes. I can't exactly call us friends, under the circumstances."

"You also neglected to inform me that he is living across the street," he continues. "That was rather irresponsible of you, surely."

“And _you_ didn’t tell me about what was recorded on your brother’s phone,” I counter. “Why not?”

I’ve got other things I’d rather be doing, but instead we talk about my neighbour. Much to my annoyance, it appears that Mycroft is unwilling to discuss the phone. Worse yet, I have been saddled with a government-issued minder. “For a few days,” Mycroft assures me briskly. “Until the question of Moran has been resolved.”

It is agreed that although the agent will be watching me, we will _both_ be watching the flat across the street. For what, precisely, it is hard to say.

“I really don’t know that he _does_ intend to kill me,” I say, for what seems like the hundredth time. The additional information I’ve been given only makes the man more unpredictable. There are things I am not allowed to know, but I think I can fill in the blanks well enough. We didn’t fight the same war. That much is clear.

“What he plans to do with you rather depends upon what he decides you are,” Mycroft says, cryptically. 

***

I tell the agent -- called Jeff, apparently; this somewhat spoils the remaining glamour of MI5 -- he'll be sleeping on the sofa. This, in turn, necessitates some brutal honesty with Mrs. Hudson. She is both gutted and indignant to hear that Bill Richardson as she knew him does not exist, but seems to find Jeff’s presence enough of a novelty to make up for it. He is a tall young Londoner of West Indian descent. I suspect she finds him dashing, and have to beg her not to mention him to Mrs. Turner.

It is a relief to get to work (mercifully Jeff-less, but in a black car that magically appears as I step outside the door) and have some time to myself. Other than the patients, that is. It’s a slow day, though, so I have plenty of time to think around the edges. 

As the afternoon winds on, I give in to my impulse to call Molly Hooper.

Ah, Molly. I should have talked to her the moment I remembered Bart’s didn’t have an A&E. The moment I realised it made no sense for an emergency response team to conveniently appear outside Pathology at exactly the right moment. If you were going to do something insane and complicated like faking your own death, and I couldn’t help you, couldn’t even _know_ what you were doing, why _not_ Molly? 

It takes me a while to think of a good way to start this conversation. “Molly! I think you helped my best friend fake his death. If you did, you have some serious explaining to do,” probably isn’t the best opener.

I decide to go with, “Molly, I’ve been talking to Greg Lestrade and Mycroft Holmes and now I need to talk to you.”

I do not expect her to answer that with,”Oh, thank God.”

When this is followed with, “I’m incredibly worried about him,” it takes me a moment to identify the “him” she means. It’s ridiculous, really.

“What do you mean?” 

“Has he spoken to you? Because usually he - I mean, for a while he was talking to me quite a lot, but maybe he’s not now, because of you. I mean, if I asked how things were, he’d answer, anyway, but now he won’t talk to me,” she gets out in a rush.

“Back up a moment.” I know there will be no returning to pretence when I add, “When you say ‘he,’ you mean - “

“Sherlock, of course,” she blurts. 

 _“Not dead, then,”_ I say quietly.

“No! I hope not.” There is a pause, followed by audible panic. “Oh no. You didn’t... He didn’t tell you!” 

“That he faked his own death? More or less in _front of me?_ No. He did not.”

She exhales into the receiver. “He’s going to kill me.”

“Not if I kill him first,” I say. What I am feeling defies description. It is beginning to resemble anger to some extent. I suspect there’s relief hidden in there somewhere, but I don’t have time for it yet.

“Well, he _should_ have told you,” she says, and adds in a surprisingly steely tone, “It’s too late now, so you might as well know the rest. Because it isn’t over yet, and I do think he’s in trouble.”

“To be fair,” I say, gentle for her sake, if not entirely for yours, “I _did_ know about Moriarty and the assassins. And I truly was beginning to suspect he wasn’t...dead. That’s why I wanted to talk to you, Molly.”

She’s quiet. I hear a faint clinking sound in the background. I imagine her methodically tidying her instrument tray as she tidies her thoughts. 

“All right, “ she says at last. “It’s... It’s just a feeling. So maybe it’s silly of me.”

“Molly,” I say, as someone ought to have done long ago, but possibly never has, “I’m sure it isn’t silly. Clearly _he_ trusted your judgement enormously. I’m inclined to respect that.”

“Thanks. It’s just that, he didn’t have anyone much to talk to anymore. So sometimes he talked to me. I mean, he stayed with me until he was well enough to travel, but even after that we’d talk from time to time.”

 _Well enough,_ I file away for future examination. Broken bones? Worse? Probably. Time enough to ferret out the details later. “But he stopped.”

“And he sounded a bit odd, before that. Even for him, I mean. He’d send me texts with strange questions at odd hours.”

I laugh a little. “He did that all the time. With me, anyway.”

“Yes. It must have been...difficult for him. So, yes. I knew he was looking for someone. Someone he couldn’t tell me anything about, except that maybe he plays cards? A gambler, I think. He kept going on about poker and blackjack for days, and then he just...stopped.”

“And you were worried, then,” I prompt, thinking _and you probably should be...._

__

_“_ Yes. And then his brother came to see me.”

“Of course he did. That must have been frightening.”

“He asked me if I knew where Sherlock was. I know they don’t get on very well, but they’ve had to, the last - ”

 **“Year,”** I interject harshly. “Yes. Sorry.”

“He really misses you,” she says softly. “I know he does.”

“Yeah,” I get out eventually. I can’t quite manage to add, “I miss him, too.”

I hate it that I know exactly who you are hunting, and I don’t know whether you’ve found him yet. Sebastian Moran is almost certainly after _you,_ and now I think I know why I’ve been left untouched. 

I am the goat staked out on the edge of the village, the helpless lure displayed to draw you towards the waiting guns.

 _So maybe there’s still hope._  

“Thank you, Molly, “ I say. “I have to go now. But thank you. You’re...a good friend.”

I stuff my feelings away - I don’t even know what they _are,_ really -- and wrack my brain for anything useful. What do I know?

Sherlock is alive. _Deal with that later._

Mycroft knows this (of course he does), and he also knows about Sebastian Moran.

It stands to reason that Sherlock is looking for Moran, and that Moran is searching for, or in all likelihood, simply _waiting for_ him. 

Sherlock is impatient. He has slipped the leash. 

Mycroft is watching Baker Street. He has sent an agent to my flat. He’s being somewhat unobtrusive, but he’s on the alert for something. Something he hasn’t bothered to mention to me, as usual.

_I have to get home._

***

When I arrive (black car again -- it’s a bit weird), Jeff and Mrs. Hudson are in the living room. Another man I’ve never seen before is standing to one side of the street-facing window, assembling a rifle with a scope. 

“This is Alan,” Mrs. Hudson says, by way of introduction. Alan is older and more practically dressed than Jeff is. I suspect he’d be ginger if his head wasn’t shaved.

“Looks serious,” I say, surprised they’ve let her remain in the room. 

Jeff tells us that Sebastian Moran has a visitor. “Some fair-haired bloke,” he says. “Probably nothing important.” 

 _So not you._ Or it might be; I don’t know. I find myself drawn towards the window, like a moth to a torch. Alan is, understandably, keeping out of sight around the corner. Eventually, I am rewarded by the sight of two more men, who I have never seen before, arriving at Sebastian Moran’s flat. It’s getting dark.

“Card game,” Alan announces, his eye still glued to the scope. I want to ask if I can have a look, but I know better than to try. 

Jeff receives a telephone call that consists of a number of clipped “Yes sirs” on his end. He has a brief, whispered conversation with Alan after this. 

“What’s going on?” I ask. 

Jeff shrugs apologetically. “We’re just watching,” he says. I suspect he's leaving something out.

“We don’t have any food in for dinner,” I announce. “I’m starved.” Mrs. Hudson, torn between her desire to be helpful and her eroding insistence that she is not my housekeeper, makes noises about cooking something, but I won’t hear of it. “I’ll just go out and get us something,” I suggest, but am in turn shot down by Jeff. Apparently, I am not allowed to leave the flat.

After some discussion, we agree that I can have food delivered, so I compile an order of Chinese for myself, Mrs. Hudson, and the two agents. We agree that I will collect it downstairs when it arrives, and that Jeff will not need to accompany me because I am a responsible adult. _With a gun,_ I add to myself. 

The next forty-five minutes are hell. 

I have a lot to think about, it’s true. Where you’ve been. What you’ve been doing. Why you didn’t tell me anything. Why you couldn’t tell me anything. What I will say to you if, no _when,_ I see you again. 

“Bit of a fight,” Alan announces, after a small eternity. “Ah. He’s got a gun.” 

“Of course he has,” I say. “By all accounts, he’s got an arsenal.” I’ve steered Mrs. Hudson far away from the window, as it seems like the reasonable thing to do. As ever, I must remind myself that not only has she put up with us, various gunmen, and constant visits from the police, but she has also been married to a murderer. She’ll be fine.

Jeff is on the telephone again, explaining the situation. I can only assume with all the “sirs” that it’s Mycroft again.

“They’re going,” Alan says, a few minutes later. 

“Who’s going?” Jeff asks. He is still on his headset.

“Just the two that arrived together,” Alan responds. “Not...Not the first one. They’re drinking now.”

Around this time, the food arrives. Painfully aware of the service pistol tucked beneath my jacket, I pull out a couple of twenty pound notes and make my way down the stairs. 

“Thanks,” I say, handing them to the young man with the carrier bags. I should go back inside immediately, but I don’t. 

No, instead I look across the street, as we have been doing all evening. 

I see a man silhouetted against the window. He must be leaning against the glass.

It’s not Sebastian Moran. 

With absurd care, I set the carrier bags down on the steps and drift out into the street. I hear feet on the stairs, on the pavement behind me. I hear Jeff hissing my name, urgently. I don’t respond.

It’s not Sebastian Moran at all. It’s _you._

__

Your hair may be strange, and your clothes are all wrong, but I’d know that profile anywhere.  And I don’t have time to think about it, much, because he’s there too, now. Sebastian Moran is there too, and he’s got a gun pointed at your head. 

But he isn’t looking out the window. He doesn’t see me.

 _Don’t look,_ I think. _You_ don’t _see me._ The SIG is in my hand, heavy and familiar.

The footsteps behind me have stopped. I can hear Jeff breathing. I can hear my own heart pounding in my chest. 

I can practically _feel_ you sliding down the glass, so silently. Almost invisibly from where I’m standing (fifteen feet away, perhaps), but I see it. I see everything.

When he smiles, I know there is no more time. 

I fire.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to the loyal readers who have offered me encouragement along the way! I hope I have not disappointed you. 
> 
> Update: I was going to take a bit of a break after this story, but then I didn't. The next bit in the series is currently underway. It is called "Silently, Invisibly."


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